Page 15 of Things You Save in a Fire

“These things happen, Cassie,” he said. “Life is messy. When you’re older you’ll understand.”

The fact that he wasn’t mad made me madder. “I hope not.”

“Nobody’s perfect,” he said.

What was he doing? Was he trying to model behavior for me? Was this some kind of teachable moment about growth and change? It seemed so patronizing. I might not know everything about forgiveness, but I sure as hell knew you didn’t get there by pretending earth-shattering betrayals had been no big deal.

Your wife cheating on you is a big deal. Your mom abandoning you is a big deal.

I wasn’t going to insult my teenage self and all she’d been through by just shrugging and saying,Nobody’s perfect.

“I think you’ve forgotten how bad it was,” I said. We’d eaten SpaghettiOs for a solid year.

“I probably have,” my dad said.

“Well, I haven’t.”

“Don’t you know that expression, ‘The best revenge is forgetting’?”

“Seems to me like the best revenge would berevenge.”

“Tell me you’re not plotting revenge on your mother.”

What would that even look like? It was far too late for revenge. “Of course not,” I said, though, in a practical sense, by keeping my distancefor so long, that’s what I’d been doing for years. “I’m just refusing to give her a pass.”

“Sweetheart,” my dad said tenderly. “Let it go.”

“She’s the one who called me!”

“It’s been adecade.”

“A decade I’ve spent building a nice little life for myself—in Texas.”

“She needs you.”

“I won’t dismantle my entire life and move across the country for a woman I’m not even close to.”

“I think she’d like to be closer.”

“Too bad. She can’t just demand closeness. She gave up the right to be close to me when she left.”

“She’s not demanding. She’s asking.”

“I can’t believe you’re defending her!”

My dad was quiet for a second. Then he said, “You know, there are people who have no choice but to spend their lives avoiding their mothers. People whose mothers are mean, or toxic, or drunk. People whose mothers hurt them every time they let their guard down. But you are not one of those people. Your mother is actually a nice lady.”

That was a lot of verbiage for my normally strong-but-silent dad. Practically a soliloquy. “How can you say that after what she did to you?”

“People make mistakes.”

“You can’t make me forgive her,” I said, barely able to believe how petulant I sounded.

“You’re right,” my dad said. “I can’t make you.”

For a split second, I thought I’d won.

Then he went on. “But you’re going to go anyway.”

---